Bookish and the Beast (Once Upon a Con #3)(37)

I like the second option even better than the first, really.

Doing anything in the library today ends up being an absolute pain. I end up propping my crutches against one of the chairs and just taking it slow as I unpack a series of fantasy books from one of the boxes. The volume I had been looking for yesterday ended up being at the bottom of a stack of books on the desk, which was fun to discover, but I push that out of my head—along with the thought that maybe it wasn’t Mr. Rodriguez who took the books off the top shelf for me the other day—and work.

Around 5:30 p.m., however, the bottle of water I chugged after school creeps up on me. I tried it with a little of Quinn’s magic medicine, but I only used half of the packet and it tasted so bad I couldn’t bring myself to dump the rest in.

And now here I am, ready to pee myself because I don’t want to go upstairs to use Vance’s bathroom.

But I can’t suffer for another thirty minutes, so I make the hard decision: I will take a warp-speed pee break and return long before Vance ever comes home from his walk with Sansa and finds out that I went tinkle on his throne. With my crutches in tow, I quickly hurry my way across the house and up the stairs to the second floor, to the bathroom at the end of the hall.

I close the door behind me and quickly do my business. There’s shaving cream on the bathroom counter, and toothpaste, mouthwash, a cheap razor—all the things my dad has on his bathroom counter. With the exception of the orange hair wrap sitting on the sink.

After I wash my hands, I turn to leave when I realize the packet of orange not-Kool-Aid has fallen out of my pocket. I pick it up, about to stick it back into my jeans, when I realize I had forgotten that I had opened it a few hours ago. And…it goes everywhere.

“Crap!” I curse, grabbing the orange hair wrap, and scrub the powder out of the sink and the tiles before it has time to dye anything orange. Thank God it’s one of those fast-absorbing towels.

I don’t want to ruin anything else in this house.

Least of all the marble countertops.





AS I JOG BACK TOWARD THE HOUSE, I don’t see the eyesore of a hatchback, so the girl must not have come today. Did Elias actually fire her? Or even if she just decided not to show up, it doesn’t matter. I would be fine either way, I’m just glad she isn’t here.

I’m not quite sure how much longer I can stay out in this heat before I get heatstroke. It’s almost October and it has barely gotten below thirty-five degrees Celsius—erm, ninety-five degrees Fahrenheit, I guess.

“Tamales tonight,” Elias says, stopping me in the kitchen.

“Delicious.” I pluck out my earbuds and take the lead off Sansa. She springs into the living room with boundless energy and face-plants into the couch.

“You’ve been gone for a while.”

“Just out running,” I reply, opening the refrigerator to get a bottle of water. I unscrew it and toss the cap into the recycling by the island counter. The hair that fell out of my ponytail is sticking to my neck, and all I want to do is go take a shower.

Down the hall, the library door is open and I can hear—humming?

A chill curls down my spine.

“She’s still here?” I ask before I can rein my surprise in.

Elias blinks. “Well, of course. Her father hasn’t picked her up yet. She can’t drive herself.”

Ah. Right.

Stupid me. Of course Elias wouldn’t fire her.

I down the rest of my water and toss the bottle into the recycling as I pass. If I didn’t know she was here, then she probably hasn’t realized I’ve returned, either. I’d rather keep it that way. I hurry up the stairs as quickly as I can and close the door to the bathroom.

Why am I running away from a girl in my own house? Why was I so terrified when she found that mask yesterday? Why am I still?

Because she can go to the tabloids, I tell myself. Because she can make things worse for you, and you don’t need things worse right now.

The shower, at the very least, is cold enough to shock the thoughts out of me. I sigh and press my forehead against the cool tiles. The cold water and quiet gets my head on straight again as I wash my hair. Can’t really recall the last time I properly washed it—when did I arrive here again? Two weeks ago? Time goes so slow in this town, in this house, day after day.

Lately, though, I’ve been too busy worrying about that girl down in the library.

And what she thinks of me.

I’m scrubbing my hair with the towel to dry it when my reflection catches my eye. Something is off. Slowly, I pull the towel off my head. The same face stares back. Nothing out of the ordinary, except…





A SCREAM EXPLODES FROM THE BATHROOM UPSTAIRS.

Uh-oh.

There’s a clattering noise, and loud footsteps rush across the ceiling. I hear him storm down the stairs. “WHERE IS SHE?” he yells, his voice cracking with either rage or tears, I’m not sure which one.

Tears, please tears, the barbaric part of me cheers.

Even though I don’t know what for.

I hear Mr. Rodriguez start saying, “Why would you—” before something loud crashes in the kitchen, as if he dropped whatever he was holding. “Dios mío,” he gasps, “what happened to your hair?”

Oh—oh no.

Before I can drop the book I’m holding—the seventeenth volume of Starfield—and dive under the desk, he storms into the library wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist and fury in his eyes.